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The city’s airport tunnel will link the terminal to hundreds of millions of dollars worth of new retail, residential, office and industrial projects planned on land developers have acquired since council approved the project three years ago.

Major developments had already been pushing forward in the farmers’ fields north and east of the airport after completion of the northeast ring road, expansion of Metis Trail and new LRT stations in the northeast.

The $295-million Airport Trail tunnel opening next weekend, to eventually provide a key east-west connector for the quadrant, has been followed by a flurry of new deals and projects to fill in the blank spaces along what might have been a major missing link around the airport, if not for council’s controversial approval of the project.

Since that early 2011 commitment of Calgary’s grant money, major developers based in Calgary and Ontario have purchased land on all four sides of the future Airport Trail-Metis Trail interchange. Millions of square feet of offices by Triovest on one side, a big box-style retail development by RioCan on another side, and new suburban communities by Genstar and Mattamy on the east side.

“These people have more assurance there’s going to be that access to the terminal and to get the trucks and cars and everything moving around where they have their land,” Coun. Jim Stevenson said.

“It’s given them more confidence to go ahead with further investment of tens of millions of dollars.”

The northeast councillor said “it’s just ridiculous” how many project applications are hitting his desk for the last major undeveloped land on the inside of the ring road.

Even on the other side of the ring, the airport tunnel comes up in an investor brief for land on the city’s far east boundary.

“The property will, in the near future, become strategic to the Airport Industrial Corridor via the new airport tunnel, and the eventual completion of Airport Trail,” says the inventory brief for Pacific Developments Ltd., for their 91-hectare industrial and commercial project.

Developers cautioned not to call the six-lane tunnel beneath the airport’s giant new runway a catalyst for their developments.

“It’s not a linchpin for the development to proceed,” said Robb Honsberger, development director for the Pacific Development venture.

“It just enhances things, because there’s more road connections when it’s complete.”

Stoney Trail and the extension of water and sewage services to the area also helped kick-start projects, he added.

Wilf Richter of Mattamy said he doubts anybody there factored in the tunnel when the Ontario-based builder acquired land for $107 million bordering Airport Trail, in the year after council’s tunnel vote.

“The airport tunnel, I think it was always going to be there and I don’t think anyone considered it one way or the other,” he said.

In fact, council had long been wary of building the costly tunnel, told by bureaucrats it wasn’t necessary. That changed when Mayor Naheed Nenshi took office, and persuaded council to narrowly approve the project.

Stevenson reckons all the development would have occurred regardless, but congestion would have become unbearable in 15 years.

Developer excitement for the tunnel might be muted because it won’t get people very far once it’s open.

As part of a deal with Calgary International Airport, the city cannot finish Airport Trail to Metis until it helps finance interchanges that lead into the terminal. The road will dead-end at 36th Street N.E., which for now is only a two-lane road south of the tunnel roadway. The big-box development and offices alongside 36th appear likely to be first to spring up, while Mattamy’s Cityscape community begins rising closer to Country Hills Boulevard near the existing SkyView Ranch neighbourhood.

While many of the city’s new arterial roadways like Metis and parts of Airport Trail are financed by developer levies, the city used provincial grant dollars for the tunnel, transportation general manager Mac Logan said.

He’s glad to see the city’s massive investment in that area beginning to pay off with plans and future bulldozer activity.

“We’ve done northeast LRT, Metis Trail, that was $60 million, and now this piece,” Logan said.

“As far as I’m concerned, $400 million of transportation infrastructure here in the last decade — we should be building out this quadrant.”

Genstar purchased its future residential lands for $75.5 million from Oscar Fech, the political gadfly who for years refused to deal with the city to build roads on his property.

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Retail, office and industrial projects springing up near airport tunnel

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